________________
OTHER IDEOGRAPHIC SCRIPTS
155
people and speaking a language belonging to the linguistic family of the Chibcha, have their own ideographic, highly pictorial system. Nothing is known about the origin of this script. Some scholars suggest that it was already in use in pre-Columbian times and that it is connected with the pre-Conquest scripts of Central America and Mexico. It is, however, preferable to consider this writing as a more recent creation.
The script is boustrophedon, i.e., in alternate lines from right to left and from left to right. The texts begin with the bottom line on the right hand side. This writing is mainly used for magic and ritual purposes.
(4) The North American Indians have not, as far as can be established, developed any complete system which can properly be considered as true writing; their pictographic mnemonic devices have already been
mentioned (see p. 33ff.). The missionary Chr. Kauder succeeded, however, in reducing into an ideographic system of writing the crude pictographs
SUCH
π &
p
201
in
Lati, eating
La A
Laverda
3-1
L&&[T]:
1868.
Gramp
Bekim
Tina bolond
Fig. 80
Micmac ideographic script
employed by the Micmac or Megum, a tribe belonging to the great linguistic family of the Algonkians. The Micmacs live in Canada, on the shores of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and on the islands, chiefly in Nova Scotia. Kauder even succeeded in printing (at Vienna in 1866) a religious work in three volumes for which he used 5.701 symbols (Fig. 80).
BIBLIOGRAPHY
G. Mallery, Picture Writing of the American Indians, Washington, 1893. E. Nordenskiold, Picture-Writings and other Documents, Geteborg, 1928
and 1930.
